Fact #6

I have two sons who are complete opposites. One is creative and imaginative and the other is logical and a true thinker. The picture is what my son Ben did with his stuffed animals before bed, he sits them all beside each other as though they are having a conversation. It amazes me that two people living in the same home can be so different. My sisters and I are all complete opposites as well. God is pretty amazing the way He makes us isn't he?

Happy Creating everyone!

Dalia Card and Another Journal Entry

Over on Kelly's Blog yesterday she posted a card with a tea bag Dalia fold flower and I fell in love with it. She is a very talented stamper and I enjoy seeing her creations. I have since made numerous Dalia's and now have to figure out what I am going to do with these lovelies. LOL!

I promised my boys that I would watch a "Boy Movie" with them tonight as my hubby is not home. So we rented "Hot Rod" a really silly boy movie (with unfortunate swearing though). I had to sensor it in a few places.

Anyway, while watching a 'boy' movie what do I do but create a 'girl' journal entry of course! I don't know why I am into drawing faces and pretty things lately... I guess I just need feminine things around me. God made me and I think most women with a desire for beauty around us, a longing to be beautiful... like a queen or a princess must feel. Maybe He has placed this desire inside of us to give us a glimpse of how special we are to Him, and how special we will be in heaven. As Jesus sacrifice made us heirs to His kingdom we God's children, are adopted heirs and therefore will be royal for eternity. What an awesome thought!

Happy Creating Everyone!

Fact #5

This is our little pup Mila. She is my fact #5... I have two boys, Josh and Ben... but if God blessed me with a girl I was going to name her Amelia and her nickname would have been 'Mila'. So when we moved to Calgary we bought our Toy poodle Papillion and named her Mila. She is my girl and I am no longer the only girl in the house!!! I convinced my girlfriend to come with me to the pet store when my hubby was out of town and we fell in love with Mila and Nancy fell in love with Mila's brother and named him Milo as a joke, but the name stuck. So now we have our pups Mila and Milo and we live across the park from each other. They are our babies!

Happy Creating!

Journal Entry & Fairy & Fact #4

I wanted desperately to try my Tattered Angels Glimmering Mist Spray so I sprayed an 8 1/2 x 11 piece of white SU Cardstock in various places with my moonlight blue and burnt red mist. I let it dry. You can't see the shimmer as well in the picture but it shimmers so beautifully in real life. I absolutely adore it! I then drew a picture of a head, I try to follow my features... green eyes, brown hair etc... and then I cut it out and drew the caption on a separate piece of paper. I cut the caption out and placed foam double mounting tape on it and placed it on my dry piece of cardstock. I then stamped my "notepad" stamp all around my drawing, filled in each notepad, stamped a few letters and voila. I then layered it onto black cardstock and stuck it in my journal. I didn't know what to create today and this is the outcome of having a sort of blah creative day - LOL. We're all allowed one of these once in awhile I think.

I drew this fairy sitting on a leaf from a drawing that Chris Down did in the book The Crafter's Design Library: Fantasy. The picture looks a lot different than the original picture because I personalized it alot and made the fairy into a woman instead of a little girl fairy. I colored her with my Gelly Roll gel markers, as well as her dress. I glittered the wings in different colors with my Making Memories Scrapbook Shimmer. Then I layered the entire drawing with my - you guessed it - self-leveling gel! I'm not too sure what I am going to do with her yet. I would like to do a large drawing of a fantasy jungle of some sort and possibly put her in there... who knows. I will wait to be inspired.

Fact #4
I have loved drawing since I was a little girl. I have never had a proper lesson but taught myself from looking at other pictures. I do not make a very good student when it comes to learning art... I find it too confining. I used to watch my oldest sister draw and then I would try to draw what she did. It has taken me many years to be able to actually draw a person and have it look proportionally correct.

Happy Creating Everyone!

Another Doodle Me This Card

Lot's of love... feelin' the love. This is the first year I have made so many Valentine's cards and I am finding it's really cool! This card was so much fun to make because I got to use my new Tim Holtz Ranger Distress Ink as well as my Tattered Angels Glimmer Mist and my new little 'Notepad' journal stamp. The letters I drew out and doodled around them as well as the sentiment "How do I love thee, let me count the ways..." and the x's and o's. The little hearts are from my 'Peace and Love' Stampin-up set. I used a q-tip and dabbed it in black and just rubbed it around the outer edge of the card to make it have a more distressed look. That's basically it.
I hope you like it.
Happy Creating everyone!

Quilt Journal Entry and Fact #2

Over at Blissfully Art Journaling there is a journal prompt weekly. Last weeks journal prompt was "Quilt". They basically give you one word and you go from there. As long as that word is on your page you have followed all the rules. I have just joined this group, looking for further inspiration. So far I am quite pleased and I do find myself inspired more.

I basically just journaled whatever came into my head... don't ask me why I put that my hair was so thick that I have broken every brush I have ever had?????? I have no idea why I put that! LOL

So... continuing on from yesterday of 100 Things about me here's #2.

#2 Considering what I journaled today... I have extremely thick hair. I have broken every brush I have ever owned and every hairdresser has commented on how thick my hair is, saying, "This is the thickest hair I have ever seen!".

Well that was easy. LOL
Happy Creating everyone.

Catherine's Freehand Challenge - First Card

A card challenge... believe it or not I have never taken part in a card challenge before. I know it's shocking! It never appealed to me because I didn't like the idea of confining my creativity to a particular challenge, not that I have read many challenges. There are more than likely many out there that I could possibly do but none have drawn my attention until this one!
Over at Catherine's blog she has put forth a challenge that I find rather intriguing. Making a card with any layout that uses mostly free hand doodles. I know the concept sounds rather scary... but why not give it a try. I love to doodle and therefore I went to work.
The card is rather easy to explain as I used no stamps and only my doodles including the sentiment and background. Even the layers I cut out myself. So I can't really give you the directions... LOL.
Catherine was so nice to contact me personally with her challenge after seeing my doodles - she knew I would love her challenge and she was right! I am going to set out to make a few more over the next few days. Thanks so much Catherine for thinking about me.
So hey, why not step out of your comfort zones and give it a try - you might just be surprised!
Happy Creating everyone!

Lettering Fun - & Blog Candy Winner

One of the things I love is learning how to doodle different letters, calligraphy etc. I took some lettering books out of the library, brought my pens out and went to work. I will be posting some of my letter doodles once I have had time to work on them, but I needed to post a picture didn't I???

Now on to the goodies!!!!!

First of all I want to thank all of your for all of your awesome support, comments and ideas to help my blog along. All of you are the best and I have so enjoyed reading your comments and getting to know all of you better. You have all been so encouraging and I have been having the best time.

Have I stalled long enough?????

Okay...

So...

The...

Winner...

of...


my...


blog...


candy...

is...



JAN SCHOLL Congratulations Jan. I will try to e-mail you for you to send me your snail mail address to send your goodies to.

Thanks everyone again for playing. I hope to continue hearing from all of you and I will be around on most of your blogs as I have subscribed to the ones I could subscribe to.

Happy Creating Everyone!

Doodling Mood - ya think??? Plus Last Day To Enter

I have really been in a doodling mood as of late. I don't know why... I have just longed for my art journal and pens. This page was all about fun girl stuff. There are many different images on here, some were inspired by surfing the net and others by looking through books and then there are those that I just felt like doodling. I love the shoes in the middle (my design) and then the zebra shoes and matching purse are from a designer which I wrote on the shoe. The "Aloha Mama" image came to me when I was longing for Hawaii and the warmth. I so want to go back there!!! The lettering of "SHOES" I used two felt markers and bound them side by side with an elastic to get this font - it is a calligraphy technique used to get even spacing through out the entire letter. The "Groovy Baby" I just had to put with this image of a 1970's lady wearing a strange psychedelic outfit! LOL! I saw this image on a shoe website and I had to draw one for myself. The rest I just filled with flourishes and fun images. I like this doodle page because I didn't have to think too much and I was able to be creative without really having a purpose.
I hope you like it!
Happy creating!

JUST A REMINDER THAT TODAY IS THE LAST DAY TO ENTER FOR MY BLOG CANDY WHICH WILL BE DRAWN TOMORROW SOMETIME. YOU CAN ENTER AS MANY TIMES AS YOU LIKE, EACH ENTRY IS ANOTHER CHANCE FOR YOU TO WIN. GOOD LUCK!

Valentines True Love

Feeling the love again! This morning as I was going through my blog subscriptions I ran into this post and Leigh had an incredible tutorial. Part of it was using a glue gun and stamping an image with the glue gun... and this gave me a great idea. Thanks Leigh for the inspiration.
The first thing I did was heat up my glue gun, find an image that I thought was romantic for Valentines day and got out my "non-stick" aluminum foil. I placed the hot glue on the non-stick side of the foil and then stamped the rose. Letting the glue dry a bit I carefully peeled the glue off of the stamp... then I used my Perfect Pearls gold and brushed it over the image.
I cut my black cardstock to the appropriate size then layered it with a piece of mulberry red paper. I sent a piece of gold shimmering paper through the cuddlebug to emboss it. I had a foamy layered embellishment that I'm not so sure where I got it from and layered it with gold pigment ink. Then I glued the glue image onto this little foam pattern piece. Lifting one corner and attaching it with brads, I then stamped the "true love" image from one of my "g" Clear Stamps set in gold with gold embossing powder, then embossed it. I find this card very romantic and beautiful. I may just give this one to my hubby for Valentines day.

Remember to scroll down and enter for my blog candy. All and any comments count and feel free to enter as many times as you like.Happy Creating Everyone!

Easter Cards in January?? & Blog Candy Reminder!

I know it's January... a little early to be posting Easter Cards... however I am making all occassion cards right now for another fundraiser I am doing at Church for Kid's Ministries. This summer our Church is having a kid's camp at a more expensive facility that will accomodate more children and have a kitchen staff (which we usually cook ourselves), though is more expensive. So... I will be selling cards to raise money to send kids who cannot afford to go to this camp.
So... my first card; A simple "Happy Easter" card made with my Nestabilities for layers, scrap paper from Costco box, the stamps are both from Stampin-up, one from an occasion set and one from an Easter set. I made this card simple for a reason, not everyone likes embellishments! I know, I know, that's crazy right???? It's true. There are some out there who really just want a simple card.
Card #2 I absolutely adore! I used my cuddlebug circles embossing folder for the background. For the half scallop behind the "Happy Easter" I used a piece of a scalloped circle and just cut it and then slid the stamping spot (SU) up to look like pedals on the scallop. The swirls are also from Stampin up as well as the half flower stamp. Then I added a little bling and voila! A lovely Easter card.
Card #3 Also a simple Easter Card. I used my Nestabilities for the scalloped circle, my cuddlebug for the background, I cut a scalloped circle to make a ribbon slider and used my slit-punch (from SU) to pull the ribbon through. The butterfly is from the "So Sweet" (I think) set from SU... I stamped it, cut it out and layered it with self-leveling gel... let it dry... then added two bling gems to it. I really like the look of the ribbon slider.
Card #4 One of my favorites again. The Cherish card. It can be used for Valentines day or Easter, or whatever occasion. I wanted to experiment with the swirls so I used two different colors of SU spots... Regal Rose and So Saffron. I stamped the So Saffron first and then the Regal Rose. Again I used the half flowers as well as the little daisies from the Baroque Motifs and stamped them in the two colors as well. Then I stamped a larger flower image, layered it with regal rose SU paper and placed it on the card with double-sided mounting tape, added my "Cherish" sentiment and my bling and away I went. I like the way it turned out.
Happy Creating!

BLOG CANDY REMINDER: Make sure you enter for my blog candy for it would give me great joy to give something away right now. Enter as many times as you like and remember the more you mention my blog in your blog and to your friends the higher the chances of you winning are!
LEAVE A COMMENT ON ANY POST, EACH COMMENT IS ANOTHER ENTRY FOR MY BLOG CANDY!!!

My Word For 2008 - Blog Cand Reminder

My word for 2008 is "Contentment" . To try and be content no matter what happens or is going on around me, to never want for more. This is a very difficult thing in this world. I decided to do a journal page on this word and see where it took me. I think it is going to be a struggle to get there every day but I am sure going to try. To explain... my struggle is that I sometimes have a hard time in battling depression and right now (winter) is very difficult for me because it is not warm, and it is not very bright outside either. So much is going on around me that to get through the day feeling content about everything in my life, well let's just say I haven't reached it quite yet - though I am still striving. I am very blessed with a wonderful godly husband who treats me like gold, and two precious boys ages 10 and 12 whom I adore (I'm not so much adoring the teenage attitude but I adore my son). I do have so much to be blessed for that it should be relatively easy to find this contentment (like Paul found in Philippians 4:11 "For I have learned that in whatever situation I am in, to be content".) I will get there for the Lord is on my side and He lifts me when I cannot lift myself!

On a much less depressing note: Make sure you enter for my blog candy for it would give me great joy to give something away right now. Enter as many times as you like and remember the more you mention my blog in your blog and to your friends the higher the chances of you winning are!
Blessings dear friends.
Happy Creating!

Scrapping My First Baby

What a lovely afternoon I had with my girlfriend Kelly. We are both SAHM and last week we decided to get together once per week and do some scrapbooking. This afternoon I was taken back to 1995-1997. I love that about pictures - they hold such wonderful memories. I especially loved the first two years with my son Joshua. I was a perfect Mommy doing all the perfect Mommy things with my new son! We would go for long walks and take mom'n'tot classes together and just spend time exploring our surroundings wherever we would go. It was the most enjoyable time of my life as a Mother.

As I have posted before, I am not afraid to cut up my pictures and this way I can fit many pictures on one page. For the letters JOSH I used my Magenta Alphabet stickers and my Making Memories Shimmering Glitter to color them in. I am really liking the outcome of these letters - the best part is that you can't go wrong with the way I discovered. Take the sticker out, place it sticky side up, sprinkle glitter, shake off glitter, put double side tape down on paper and place sticker on glittered side onto tape. Voila, your done! This page was a wonderful time spent down memory lane! I hope you enjoy it.

Happy Creating Everyone!

TAC Blog Candy!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Ema has some sweet TAC Candy to giveaway. Who doesn't love TAC. It is beautiful. Check it out!

Happy Creating Everyone!

More Valentines Day Cards

More V-day cards. Another butterfly "You make my heart have wings" and my Nestabilities scallop circles layered on my Costco scrapbook paper. The butterfly was drawn then layered with self-leveling gel and Adirondack Ginger Alchol ink. I embroidered the body of the butterfly and layered it with a few specks of stickles stardust and placed a small gem at the top and bottom of the body.

"With Love" was stamped with "Potted Hearts" Vap Scrap stamp from Michaels. This card was layered with my Nestabilities scallop circles. The cardstock SU Brocade Blue was embossed with my cuddlebug.

I hope you enjoy them.

Happy Creating Everyone!

Feel The Love Cards

Okay... I'm finally getting into the Valentine's Day mood. After seeing all the beautiful cards all of you stamping bloggers have out there I am officially inspired to create my own.
These two cards were relatively easy... they just took all afternoon to make because there is alot of cutting out and layering.
Here's the scoop: Michael's low price cardstock (camel), SU Close to Cocoa and Chocolate Chip Stampin Spots for background, Costco Scrapbox stack paper, Future Shop Ipod bling gems (99cents) if you can still find them) and Michael's diamond gem from 2006 $1.50 pack of gems. "I Love You" sentiment Studio G Series 6 stamps, "With Love" Anita's Stamps. SU Word Slot punch.
I cut each flower out and each layer, layered them either on SU Old Olive, or Camel cardstock.

Hope you enjoy them.
Happy Creating Everyone!

You Make My Heart Flutter Card

If you've been following my blog lately, you will know that I have been going through a butterfly phase. Maybe because Spring is coming??? In Calgary that doesn't happen for a few months! Anywho... I have made all sorts of different butterflies. Today's card uses one of my butterfly doodles.
The paper is from my beautiful box of Costco Scrapbook paper. I used Spellbinders Nestabilities for the scalloped cirles. I wrote the "You Make My Heart Flutter" sentiment, and for the butterfly I drew it out, put a layer of self-leveling gel and then dropped my Adirondack Alcohol Ink (Tim Holtz) ginger onto the gel right away. I let that dry, set it aside overnight and then did my second layer with gel and alcohol ink. This is my first time using these alcohol inks and I have to say that I am addicted. I love them! I have been keeping up with the Tim Holtz website and I am really loving what he is coming out with. His newest product looks fabulous - GRUNGEBOARD. Check it out on his site, you won't regret it. I don't think it comes to stores until after the big Distributor's Show in February. I can't wait for it to come as I will definitely be purchasing some, especially the alphabet grungeboard.

Happy Creating Everyone!

Girl Time Doodles

I was seriously in need of some Girl-time doodling and have been working on this journal page for two or three days. For some reason I was having a hard time getting into "Girl" mode and I think that's because I am surrounded by boys! I love being a "boy" mom, but sometimes I forget how to be a girl! Does that make sense? Then I have this desire in me to do girlie things and my brain says, "what's that?" because it has been awhile! LOL

So... posted today are some girlie doodles. I hope you enjoy.
Happy creating!

Men Wonder Why We Have So Many Pairs of Shoes?

Carlos By Carlos Santana
Giuseppe Zanotti Design
Annette Shoes Marie Antoinette
Jeffrey Campbell
Bongo Shoes (unknown creator)

In all my boredom this evening I went blogging for creative inspiration. What did I discover???? SHOES! I went surfing for cute high heel shoes and searched over 3,500 pairs. What did I learn?
1. Not many pairs caught my eye
2. I love looking at shoes but know I cannot wear them (high heels that is)
3. The funkier the shoes are, the better!

The multi-colored shoes by Carlos: the first thing I thought of was Arizona. I pictured a well-to-do lady wearing a cool blue blouse with a bolero type jacket matching the shoes, and I'm not sure is she is wearing a skirt or pants (you wouldn't want to hide these shoes with pants would you? Either that or a really cute matching sundress, big sunglasses and a oversized beighe round hat protecting her from the sun.

The Giuseppe Shoes: I pictured a business woman on her day off wearing blue jeans and a white blouse, I picture desert like roads and a jeep too... hmmm?

Annette Shoes: ...well I guess I pictured the movie Marie Antoinette (Kirsten Dunst)... I have no idea where else you could possibly wear shoes like these. LOL

The Jeffrey Campbell shoes: I again pictured a business woman, but not a high-powered business woman. More like a secretary with black dress pants and paisley blouse. Matching the colors in the shoes (light salmon pink, cool ocean blue) with her accessories, maybe a cool blue hairband.

The Bongo Shoes: Definitely high-powered business woman. Matching pinstriped pants, white blouse with a little lace camisole and silver accessories. Very neat and tidy person.

Okay... so I should never become a fashion designer. These are just the pictures I had in my mind the second I saw these shoes. I thought they were cool.

Please feel to leave your own comments here with what you first pictured when you see these shoes. I would love to hear from you.

Happy Creating Everyone!

Here's My Baby Helping Me

I forgot to add a picture of my son Benjamin helping me make butterflies. Here he is. Isn't he a cutey pie! I love my creative time with him.

Happy Creating!

Butterfly Season? Cute Butterfly Doodles

As you may have noticed I have posted everything but cards lately... it is because I made so many Christmas cards that I am sort of in a "creative funk" when it comes to making anymore cards right now... and yet I still feel very creative, just not for cardmaking. Lately I have been doodling all sorts of different butterflies. I don't know why I have been drawn to them lately (no pun intended as I did draw them), but they have consumed all my creative attention as of late. My youngest son Ben has been making some of them with me and I have enjoyed that time together as his little imagination goes from one story to another about his baby butterfly and big brother butterfly. It is nice to have such an imaginative little one (well, he's 10 and he'll always be my little one... even when he's not so little anymore).
I have been drawing the butterflies and then coloring them in different ways.
Here are some of items I used in making these butterflies;
Staedtler Markers,
Making Memories Shimmering Glitter,
Black fine point markers,
Alcohol inks,
Stampin-up stamping spots (numerous)
Self-leveling Gel
Card stock (Usually white, sometimes ivory)
(Note: I think I got one of the butterfly ideas from a stampin-up image in the catalogue (New catalogue))
Happy Creating!

New Product News - Crop-a-dile II Big Bite

Look at what I found? On-line of coarse. I'm not sure if it is for sale quite yet but isn't it cool! I think it reaches up to 6". It does what the Crop-a-dile can't and that is have a further reach so that you can put holes where you want them! Yahoo! I can't wait for it to come out! What an awesome tool - okay... I guess my eyelet setter can put holes where I want them too, but IT'S A NEW TOY! HELLO? Do you hear me gals or what? Boys have their toys and we have ours! (No offense to the crafty guys!)
Happy Creating!

My Wall Climbing Monkey - Ben Page

My youngest son Ben loves to scrapbook pictures with me. Over the holidays we scrapped a whole bunch of pictures and put them all on one page. This is how he likes to scrap pictures of him. Once I showed him the technique of cutting out the people in the pictures and placing them all over the page to create a story, he fell in love! On this particular page we have Benjamin climbing up the page (he was actually climbing up our door frame - which Daddy hates but Mommy had to take a picture!) He loved the idea of the other "Ben's" grabbing onto the top "Ben". He created a story as he was looking at each picture. After we cut them out I had Ben trace the holes in the pictures (made from cutting out his image) and create an art page of silhouettes of himself to put beside the picture (I haven't taken a photo of it yet). I always like to put an artistic twist on things and this extra page of silhouettes of him allows me to do just that as well as capture a bit of his 10 year old mind as he colors them in! Tricky huh? I hope you enjoy this fun page.
Happy Creating Everyone!

Scrapping Over The Holidays - Hawaii Album

What better time to scrapbook Hawaii pictures than during Christmas Holidays - the memories take me back to the warmth and beauty of Oahu. I long for the warm sun and the beach this time of year so this way I guess I get the best of both worlds while scrapping these "warm" pictures.
The two pictures "Time to Boogie" was my 10 year old son's idea because they are boogie boarding with their protective daddy. He used to be a lifeguard back before we even met and I think those skills stayed with him as he never left the boys side when they were in the ocean. He is the best Daddy I could every be blessed with for my boys! (Sometimes he's a little overprotective of our babies... for example when our firstborn came into the world he barely let me hold him! LOL He only let the doctor check him out making sure he was healthy though he held him to get his little prick in the heel and wouldn't let the nurses take him! He didn't even let my mom hold him and she was in the delivery room with us! Needless to say she didn't come to my second son's birth... hmmmm.... I wonder why???? LOL.) I would much rather have him overprotective than not care at all right? I am very blessed.
The first picture the boys and I were playing around with our camera underneath a beach umbrella on one of the 'heatwave' days. We had so much fun 'beachin' it in Hawaii. There are no beaches like it in Calgary, Alberta that I know of. One of these days we will definitely make it back there.
I hope everyone is staying warm during the winter months.
Happy creating everyone!

Doodling Contentment At Family Camp Weekend

Before I went away for the weekend to a Family Camp Lodge I had a number of things occur that made me feel very ill-contented. We had a death in the family which was very sad and my computer crashed and I lost almost a year's worth of information. I should have learned to back-up my computer by now - seriously what a 'dumb' thing for me not to do! Anyway... as I was away I did some doodling on 'contentment'. I don't know how to remain content once I have achieved it from God - things always take me away veering me off in all sort's of directions luring me into the vortexes of this world when really all I want to do is stay on the 'narrow path'. I had a number of discussions this weekend that pertained to this very subject and I spent time in prayer and devotion. As Paul stated in Philippians 4:11 "... for I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content." Wow, what a statement! Nothing but the strength of God could bring him to this place of contentment.
After doodling and searching and once again praying... I have let go of the loss that last week held and I am holding strongly onto what God has in store for me in the present and future. Thank you God that I was able to let it go!
Well, happy creating everyone! I pray that all of your new year will be very blessed.